TAMING THE VOID. 50 years of Ural Contemporary Art

The Ural Branch of NCCA ROSIZO,
The Volga-Vyatka Branch of NCCA ROSIZO,
supported by
The Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation
Taming the Void. 50 years of Ural Contemporary Art
March 1 - May 20, 2018

The exhibition was created and presented in 2017 by the team of the Ural Branch of NCCA in Ekaterinburg and was subsequently exhibited in Moscow as one of the best regional projects of 2017. It will continue its journey around Russia and will be shown in Krasnoyarsk and Perm after Nizhny Novgorod.
Taming the Void presents a large-scale research into the contemporary art of the Ural region, from 1960s — the moment when an alternative artistic environment emerged —till nowadays.
Fifty years and fifty key names are aligned in a chronological sequence, from the 1960s conceptualist art of Valery Dyachenko and underground art of Evgeny Malakhin (Old man B.U. Kashkin) in 1970-1980, till contemporary art objects by Timofey Radya and “Where the Dogs Run” art group. Project geography: Ekaterinburg, Nizhny Tagil, Chelyabinsk.
TAMING THE VOID is more than a page from the 50-year old history of the Ural art: it is also a narrative of a unique cultural situation that unfolded in the Urals. The exhibition reflects upon the process through which an art scene emerges in a non-metropolitan city, literally springing up out of the void in regions far removed from the cultural centers and gradually developing its own language and individuality.